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The Finals – Blow by Blow

After fighting through two hard fought, one-point matches, against Moscow Red Legion and Tampa Bay Damage, Houston Heat heads into the finals with Los Angeles Infamous ready to win their second event of the year.

But it didn’t look good at the very beginning.

Chad George gets shot off the break and Sergey Solnyshkov, their top ranked player heading into the event, gets shot out of his bunker 25 seconds into the first point.

With the heavy guns of Nicky Cuba and Damien Ryan, who had both played amazing this event, Infamous steals the early momentum.

Heat starts the next point by spreading out wide, which is a risk, since they lost bodies early in the first point. But they can’t let Infamous intimidate them this early into the match; they have to be able to get out wide off the break.

Heat shoots Greg Siewers off the break. Then, Damien Ryan draws a minor penalty, which pulls Nicky Cuba out too. With both center players out, Siewers gone and only two bodies left for Infamous, Heat ties it up quick. As Chad George grabs the flag, Sam Monville had broken a ball in the corner bunker and by the time he cleaned his barrel, the point was over.
Start of the 3rd point both teams are full strength off the break but, right away, Infamous’ Zach Patient dies off the snake side, and a few seconds later Heat’s Mikhail Knyazev dies off the Dorito side, evening it up at 4 bodies apiece.

Then Chad George crawls up the snake past the 50-yard line, and gets a shot on Bobby Aviles of Infamous, in the back center. Leaving only Greg Siewers and Damien Ryan left against 4 Heat bodies. Chad George gets two kills in the point. Score is now 2-1, Heat on top. They took full advantage of the momentum shift from the penalty.

Now down one point after the early lead, Infamous is looking to get back in the match. Nicky Cuba has a few choice words for his teammates right before the start of the point.
For Heat, Sam Monville gets shot off the break, and has Nick Slowiak and Mikhail Knyazev stuck in the back bunkers. Knyazev knows he needs to get out wide and fights his ways out and up the field.

Nicky Cuba gets shot out of his bunker as Heat evens it up at 4 bodies each.
Now Damien Ryan and Bobby Aviles are stuck in the back center, Bobby’s gun-fighting for his life, and gets shot.

So Infamous throws two bodies back, and now Heat has the advantage.
Chad George slips as he tries to dig out to get some distance on the snake side and almost gets shot by Damien Ryan but he’s able to make it out. Fedorov has 2 kills at this point. He’s playing real confident, way off the 30-yard line bunker.

Damien Ryan gets shot, George pushes up the snake side and Heat closes out another point.

Score is 3-1, three unanswered by Heat. Four points have been scored in five minutes.

The Heat pit is very calm, and when the cameras cut into the pits, Slowiak even let’s out a wide smile.

Walking out for the next point, Infamous is suited up for a long point, with all their players carrying around 10 or more pods. Things look good for them as the horn blows; Sam Monville and Sergey are shot right after the break. Now, Infamous has the body advantage 3-5 and have Brad McCurley in the snake.

Fedorov does damage control by running out to the snake side back bunker. Damien Ryan gets shot as Heat is trying to get back control of the point. Brad McCurley makes his way into the snake 50. Slowiak, Mikhail Knyazev, and Fedorov are the only men left for Heat. Slowiak gets shot out. Siewers, McCurley, and Aviles fight back for Infamous to make it a one-point match, stopping the 3 unanswered points, a run for Heat started by the Damien Ryan penalty.

It’s now 3-2.

Fedorov gets shot by Greg Siewers, near the start of the point. This is huge for Infamous because Fedorov has 5 Confirmed Kills in the game so far. Chad George and the rest of the Heat crew are in the back bunkers. Up to this point George and Fedorov are leading the Heat in kills for the final game. George has 4 to Fedorov’s 5.

Infamous’ Kevin Rudolph gets into the snake, and he hadn’t seen a lot of playing time during this match. So Infamous is up, 5 bodies to 4, and are almost in the 50-yard line on the Dorito side. But Siewers gets shot out of his spot, which Cuba fills as Kevin Rudolph moves up. Then Rudolph drops the ball, comes up over the top of his bunker and gets shot, allowing Monville to make it into the snake for Heat.
Now Heat has the advantage.

With 8:00 mins left, though they’re down bodies, Infamous has to push into Heat. Knowing this, Cuba tries to move up, but the angle is too small and he gets taken out. Infamous concedes the point with 7:08 left on the clock, bringing the score to 4-2.

For the next point, it looks like Infamous gets a break, as Brad McCurley shoots Chad George off the break, and Greg Siewers is able to get into the 50-yard line Dorito.

A long point goes by until Infamous starts pushing into the back line of Heat. Monville steps up in the pressure situation, like he did in Heat’s win in Phoenix, holding off the aggressive push. Everyone dies and no point is awarded.

But Greg Siewers also gets a penalty as the point ends. Infamous must start down a body down two points, with a little over a minute to play.

Damien Ryan runs up the center and gets a kill as the point starts but then ends up dying trying to gunfight his way up the field.

Patient gets in the snake and shoots out Fedorov, while Bobby Aviles tries to cut up the center, with under :50 seconds to go. Siewers comes out of the box and Patient is able to shoot Mikhail Knyazev. Siewers hangs the flag with 1 second, but it was too little too late, and Infamous didn’t have enough.

Heat wins by one point.

Houston Heat has now won two events out of the last three. They beat Moscow Red Legion, Tampa Bay Damage, and Los Angeles Infamous in one day to win the 2012 PSP Mid-Atlantic Open in dramatic fashion. Again, similar to their Phoenix Open win, they used solid teamwork, great coaching, and had multiple players step up, while beating three of the best teams in the world to prove their dominance.

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